Is this Intersex condition realistic & sensitive?

[cavitycollector]

Hello. I am writing a comic, and in the comic there is a man who is meant to be intersex. I have done as much research as I could find into different Intersex experiences and though I’ve seen none that are identical to his, based on what I’ve read think it is possible? I think I probably have an okay enough grasp of the actual science behind it, but in terms of his personal experiences I’m not sure.

He is a man in his late 20s. He currently has notable breasts, a deep voice, a lot of body hair, and is very heavyweight. For his backstory so far I have written: He was born in the 1990’s with male appearing genitalia, and was assigned male at birth due to this. He was raised as a boy, but during childhood he began to experience negative symptoms such as fatigue, weightloss, muscle weakness, and early development of body hair and odor (precocious adrenarche). He was seen by a doctor who determined he was actually female, and his parents not knowing what direction to go with hormone therapy let him choose. He chooses estrogen for a female puberty because he has always behaved femininely and been bullied for this, so he believes this might be the answer. (He also starts other treatments for the other symptoms of congenital adrenal hyperplasia) Once he begins this therapy and transition develops breasts, he realizes he doesn’t want to continue with female hormones and asks to be socialized as male again and to start male hormone treatments instead.

Throughout this, his parents would be trying to do what is right while completely out of their element, and there would be some conflict about the difficulty of resocializing as female and then male again. they would not really understand and slightly resent losing their son, and then again not understand and be both frustrated by the switch and also relieved to have their son back. In adulthood his parents do not acknowledge his technical female sex, they just desire normalcy.

My main concern is the parents, doctors, and character himself choosing a female puberty at first. I have no idea if that is realistic, especially for the 90s. Most of the experiences I’ve read even when the child is ”biologically the opposite sex”, they continue being raised as their AGAB with or without their consent. I know this experience would be unusual in that way, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t be possible. I feel some parents may justify it because it is technically their “true sex” and therefore bioessentialism states they must be raised as their “true sex”. These parents would have been willing to go either way and believe whatever their son seemed to lean towards due to their complete ignorance on the subject.

If you believe this is unrealistic, what other ways could I come about having an intersex character with these adult physical traits, who identifies as male, and is fully accepted as such by his family, who have been shown to NOT be accepting of transgender people, just him due to it being a “real medical problem”.

Comments

[yalovetz]

I would seriously rethink writing an intersex character, given the way you currently talk about intersex people. You've called intersex variations "disorders", referred to intersex people's genitals as "abnormal", and seem to have done most of your research by looking at pathologising medical information, which is problematic given how frequently intersex people are seriously traumatised by the medical establishment. Try reading up on the subject using resources from intersex-led organisations and researchers, such as OII.

[cavitycollector]

ive been looking at pathologizing medical information because i need specific info on specific intersex conditions, which none of the intersex run foundation pages ive gone over have covered as in depth as medical journals do. and perhaps I am using outdated over medicalized language and I apologize for that, but most of these are terms I’ve heard my intersex friends use to describe themselves so I assumed those ones were fine. I read several articles and blog posts of strangers personal accounts about living as intersex too, but none of them ever corrected any of the language so i didn't get that there either.

I filled in the blanks of things i hadn't heard before with what the papers were telling me, and used my knowledge of how doctors treat “biological sex” for flavor in certain places to fit the setting. I 100% admit, i haven't done as much research into the broader societal issues of intersexuality as would be required to write this character, I'm fully aware!!! thats why this is a WIP!

so far the reason I only relied on a few personal experiences and medical documents was because i went “oh, ill just figure out what condition he has first so i can cross reference that while i read through the lived experience literature!” and fell down a confusing rabbithole that made me rethink the whole character and im now just trying to wrap my head around that so i can get back to the cultural research.

I’m in the earliest stages of research and i thought popping in here to get some feedback on this rough draft of a possible origin for the character design i created and fell in love with years ago, using as much of the medical knowledge i could gather to be accurate; would be helpful to push me along so i could get back to the sociological research. this is my first time posting so maybe i misunderstood the culture here.

i probably shouldn’t have used the word sensitive in the title since that isnt quite my goal yet, it was more like “is it completely out of touch?” than “is it perfectly modern and correct?” i will be working on correcting my offensive language. i already planned to read those things, i just got distracted with this.